As TheTruthAboutPLAs.com readers know, Murray was the subject of a scathing Aug. 5 report by the Ohio Inspector General’s (IG) office in which the IG’s office brought to light Murray’s effort to drive lucrative school construction contracts to Big Labor.  The IG’s report outlines Murray’s advocacy for union-only project labor agreements (PLAs) and repeated displays of misfeasance in carrying out his duties.

This investigation and subsequent report were triggered by accusations from several local school officials that Murray not only used his position to pressure school districts into requiring PLAs on school projects, but also allowed union goons to berate local school officials until they agreed to Big Labor’s demands.

More information on the IG’s report and the numerous editorial boards that have called for Murray’s resignation are available in our earlier posts.

The new ad, which demands that Gov. Strickland fire Richard Murray, is available here.

ABC of Ohio also released the following statement on the recent developments at the OSFC on Labor Day (Our emphasis added):

Drive up Costs and Unemployment by Breaking the Law

This Labor Day brings sad news to the 20% unemployed construction industry Ohioans desperately in need of an economic turnaround. Governor Ted Strickland prefers to cling to 79 year-old labor policies rather than embrace the current economic realities. Other states have –and they are eating our lunch as a result.

Since Richard Murray’s appointment as executive director of the Ohio Schools Facilities Commission (OSFC) late last year, he has pushed the use of union-only Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) on local school districts hoping to obtain state funding support for local school construction. PLAs are good for unions and bad for taxpayers. PLAs inflate the cost of public construction and put people out of work. Moreover, PLAs are illegal for use on OSFC school construction projects.

A recent report by the Ohio Inspector General’s office detailed how Gov. Ted Strickland fired former state senator and fellow Democrat, Michael Shoemaker at the behest of labor unions. It turns out Director Shoemaker was not aggressive enough in forcing local school districts to accept the use of PLAs.

Upon appointment as the OSFC’s new director, Richard Murray’s actions demonstrated he was a soldier anxious to impress his boss, Gov. Strickland. Mr. Murray quickly set about to get as many local school districts to use their “local authority” to adopt union only PLAs. The Inspector General detailed how Murray used intimidating tactics to obtain these contracts for his former union employers.

Last year the OSFC adopted a policy to allow local school districts choose whether or not they wanted to use union only PLAs for their construction. There is only one problem – the OSFC does not have the authority to supersede state law and grant this local choice.

In 1997 the sixty-six year-old prevailing wage statute was amended to forbid local school districts from paying prevailing wage on their construction projects. They did this because they knew it would save money. And save money, it did. A study by Ohio’s Legislative Services Commission concluded that at least $487.9 million dollars were saved in the first five years after the law was changed.

Two years later Ohio amended the prevailing wage statute again. Because repealing union scale prevailing wage saves so much money, the legislature said county and municipal hospitals will no longer be on the list of public construction projects forced to pay prevailing wage. However, the legislature specifically granted these local public hospitals the right to pay prevailing wage if they choose to do so locally.

No such right of local choice has ever been granted to local school districts by the legislature. And the OSFC, as a creature of the legislature, is not authorized to grant that legislative authority.

Paying prevailing wage as a result of a locally engaged PLA is a ruse concocted by Gov. Strickland’s OSFC so that the will of the legislature prohibiting prevailing wage on school construction could be subverted.

The PLA ruse is not legal, wastes millions of taxpayer dollars and restricts 85% of the commercial construction industry (nonunion contractors) from the chance to work on school construction projects. That is why the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) have two law suits pending before the Ohio Supreme Court. We’re asking the Ohio Supreme Court to accept review of the questions as to whether local school districts may require contractors to pay prevailing wage and whether taxpayers living in that same school district have the right to bring a lawsuit.

For sixty-one years ABC has fought for the free market principle that public construction contracts should be awarded to the lowest cost bidder qualified to do the work. The public pays too much for construction when laws, or illegal agency policies, prevent nonunion contractors from bidding on public jobs. Ohio has been slow to learn this lesson and other states stand well poised to steal our companies as a result.

Gov. Strickland, the OSFC and Director Murray are implementing a scheme designed to thwart the will of the legislature. In doing so, they deny open competition and dramatically increase the cost on school construction projects. They also put construction employees out of work.

No one should be surprised that Ted Strickland wants to steer government contracts to his labor union allies. Since Michael Shoemaker was fired by Strickland for not doing the same and Richard Murray has shown he is all too eager to push this illegal policy, it’s up to the courts to defend the separation of powers and win one for the taxpayers.

Please visit our earlier posts for more information on this scandal.

Here is the Tribune-Review’s take (“The Penn Hills PLA,” 9/8/10):

Eight Penn Hills School District board members who voted to require only union labor on a construction project ensured that taxpayers will bear needless additional costs — and set a bad example for students.

Those eight are guilty of “failing to do their homework” before voting for the project labor agreement (PLA) on Penn Hills’ $130 million high school and elementary center project, as Bob Glancy put it. He’s chairman of Associated Builders & Contractors of Western Pennsylvania, whose members employ the 85 percent of area construction workers who aren’t unionized — firms and workers who are unfairly denied opportunities by PLAs.

The group, whose lawsuit over another PLA prompted Community College of Allegheny County to halt bidding on a science center project, is considering suing the school district, too. So one way or another, Penn Hills taxpayers will pay more — either for district legal costs or for costs that the district’s PLA will add to its project, as studies prove that PLAs do.

Still, it’s a “teachable moment.” Penn Hills students get real-world lessons about the consequences of blowing off homework and disregarding basic economics — lessons their elders on the board should have learned long ago.

As usual, the Tribune-Review is right on point.

If you live in this school district, we strongly encourage you to contact your school board members at 412-793-7000 and tell them that taxpayers deserve the best construction product for the best price.  Say NO to wasteful and discriminatory PLAs.

UPDATE: Here is a great blog post from a Penn Hills resident that is not happy with their school boards “sop” to Big Labor: http://www.libertyreborn.com/2010/09/09/penn-hills-school-district-lays-down-with-dogs/

As readers of TheTruthAboutPLAs.com are aware, the Ohio Inspector General’s (IG) office released a scathing report on August 5 that brought OSFC E.D. and former Laborers official Richard Murray’s efforts to promote Big Labor’s agenda to light.  The IG’s report outlines Murray’s advocacy for union-only project labor agreements (PLAs) and repeated displays of misfeasance in carrying out his duties.

This investigation and subsequent report was triggered by accusations from several local school officials that Murray not only used his position to pressure school districts into requiring PLAs on school projects, but also allowed union goons to berate local school officials until they agreed to Big Labor’s demands.

More information on the IG’s report and the numerous editorial boards that have called for Murray’s resignation are available in our earlier posts.

Last week, there were two interesting items of note in the Columbus Dispatch.

First, the Dispatch reported that the OSFC approved a policy that expressly prohibits Executive Director Murray’s behavior in support of Big Labor and PLAs in the future.

Here is an excerpt from the Columbus Dispatch’s coverage (“Facilities Panel: Chief Can’t Coerce Schools,” 8/27/10):

The Ohio School Facilities Commission unanimously approved a policy yesterday clarifying that it would be inappropriate for its executive director “to coerce or threaten retribution” to get school districts to use union construction firms.

[snip]

Murray said after the meeting that he didn’t consider the resolution an indictment of how he has run the commission since being picked by Gov. Ted Strickland last fall. Rather, the commission was responding to the inspector general’s recommendation that it take action to ensure neutrality, Murray said.

“That’s nonsense,” said Bryan Williams, a lobbyist with the nonunion Associated Builders and Contractors of Ohio. “Today’s resolution, which was rushed and premature, was absolutely a repudiation of the way Richard Murray has conducted himself on this job.”

[snip]

The inspector general accused Murray of pressuring local school officials to use union construction firms. In one instance, Murray sat silently while a union official with whom he’d arrived at the meeting used profanity and racial slurs to describe the work force that the district was using, according to the report.

Murray’s “reputation has been stained,” said state Sen. Gary Cates, a Republican from West Chester who is a nonvoting member of the commission.

“We have had those conversations with the executive director about how his performance could improve,” said voting member Hugh Quill.

If Executive Director Murray is looking for ways to improve his job performance, we humbly recommend that he start by putting the interests of taxpayers ahead of those of his buddies back at the union hall.

The item of note from last week’s Dispatch came in the form of a letter to the editor from a local resident that is fed up with the kind of political handouts that are plaguing the construction of the Ohio Schools for the Blind and Deaf.  As a direct result of PLA requirements on these projects, bids came in over $11 million (or almost 50 percent) higher than anticipated.

Here is an excerpt from the August 26 letter (“Do the Right Thing for Blind, Deaf Kids,” 8/26/10):

While reading about the Ohio School Facilities Commission, I never cease to be amazed at the politics and mudslinging involved, especially in building the schools for the blind and deaf children (“Blind, deaf schools project to be cut back,” Dispatch article, Aug. 14).

Whatever happened to doing the right thing? Are we too entrenched in Democrats vs. Republicans, unions vs. nonunion contractors and greed vs. a normal profit margin? It’s a sad day when “prime contractors probably withheld their best quotes” and “contractors did not want to tip their hand in this round,” as paraphrased from commission Executive Director Richard Murray.

Well, now the projects are being drastically scaled back while the campuses of both schools lie in ruins. The grounds have been torn up and will remain so while the powers that be take their sides. Do people not have consciences anymore?

There is no shortage of people who should be hanging their heads in shame over this fiasco. Is it still possible for decent people to step up and build school facilities that serve our blind and deaf children from throughout Ohio?

This letter’s sentiment is very important.  The writer simply wants to get the best construction product for the best price.

It is important for the citizens of Ohio to understand that the tactics described in the second paragraph of this letter are a direct result of the PLA requirements that Murray worked to put into place as a condition of winning these projects.

It is nearly impossible for prime contractors to accurately anticipate construction costs in a marketplace where the vast majority of subcontractors are essentially barred from bidding competitively.

Additionally, the number of subcontractors that actually bid on the project may be lower than those that say they would do so when the prime contractor begins to solicit bids as a result of a PLA mandate.  As any freshman economics student call tell you, a decrease in supply leads to an increase in price.  The result is higher construction costs.

All of this could be avoided if OSFC officials had allowed fair and open competition to flurish, instead of allowing Big Labor to browbeat local school officials.

Read our earlier posts for more information on this controversy.

Murray has been the subject of an investigation by the Ohio Inspector General’s office TheTruthAboutPLAs.com covered here and here.

The Columbus Dispatch editorial (“Bias is inexcusable,” 8/19):

Commission exec has duty to help schools get best possible deal on projects

Thursday, August 19, 2010 02:56 AM

Whether state law frowns on favoring union contractors or is silent on the issue, to engage in such a bias when spending public dollars is a bad policy that cheats Ohioans.

The purpose of the Ohio School Facilities Commission is to set standards for and monitor the construction and remodeling of billions of dollars worth of school buildings, paid for by a combination of state bond money and local tax dollars. The commission is charged with getting the best deal for taxpayers, not implementing any governor’s labor-relations philosophy. School-construction contracts certainly should not be used to shower unprecedented largess on the current governor’s favorite special interest.

Richard Murray, whom Gov. Ted Strickland appointed as executive director of the commission, is unabashed by the Ohio inspector general’s report that says he has made plain his preference for union labor when working with local school districts trying to build new schools.

Murray, who was employed for 12 years as Ohio director of a union-advocacy group and who remains a member of Local 423 of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, says he doesn’t have to be neutral — that such a requirement “is simply nowhere in law or in rule or in policy of this agency.”

It is, however, the only ethical approach to take when holding the purse strings to about $3 million per day in public spending. Murray is supposed to help local school officials, who aren’t construction experts, make the best deals for their districts. That means soliciting bids and choosing the contractors who can do the work needed for the best price, regardless of whether their employees pay union dues.

The inspector general’s report shows, however, that Murray has pushed districts to sign project-labor agreements, which typically shut out nonunion shops and, consequently, drive up the cost of projects. Such agreements require any workers on the project to be dues-paying union members, if only for the duration of the project.

Nonunion companies often decline to bid rather than comply; fewer companies bidding mean less competition and higher costs.

What were local school-board members and superintendents supposed to think when the union delegation visiting them to lobby for union labor included Murray, the guy who controls the funds? It’s obvious how officials of Scioto County’s Clay Local School District felt, after union bully Gary Coleman, angry that the district was using a nonunion contractor on part of a project, screamed profanities at them in what was supposed to be a business meeting. All that time, Murray sat by silently.

Clay officials eventually signed a project-labor agreement, but they complained to Strickland about Coleman’s and Murray’s behavior.

Murray said later he wasn’t proud of the incident.

He should feel just as bad that his support for unions, rather than for school districts and taxpayers, drives up the cost of projects — even when nobody screams profanities.

Here are some recent articles to put this editorial into context for readers unfamiliar with this controversy:

• Columbus Dispatch: “Blind, deaf schools project to be cut back,” 8/14
  • NBC 4 Video here.
• Columbus Dispatch: “Official says his union bias is allowed,” 8/14
• Columbus Dispatch: “School facilities leader OK with labor agreements,” 8/17

As readers of TheTruthAboutPLAs.com have come to find out, project stabilization agreement is just another term for a project labor agreement (PLA).

In other words, new name…same old waste and discrimination.

In response to the PLA requirement in the bid documents, several contractors that would have bid this work and the Western Pennsylvania Chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) filed a lawsuit against the community college to seek an immediate injunction barring the school from requiring a PLA as a condition of working on the project.

On Tuesday, August 10, in response to this lawsuit, the college cancelled the bids and put the project on hold while they assess their next move.  This development was covered by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (“CCAC Campus Project Bidding on Hold,” 8/11/10), here is an excerpt from their story:

Associated Builders & Contractors of Western Pennsylvania, the trade group that sued Monday, asked a judge to delay construction on the science center because of a so-called project labor agreement that would require 90 percent of workers to belong to labor unions.

College officials have said the requirement mirrors one Allegheny County uses, but county officials said they do not require agencies to use a specific percentage of union labor. Construction of the center relies heavily on state taxpayer funding.

[snip]

The Tribune-Review detailed the issue in a story Sunday (“CCAC Project Labor Mandate Irks Competitors,” 8/8/10).

Several Pittsburgh-area business owners who are part of the lawsuit said they felt excluded by CCAC’s requirement to include so many union workers, which they said is unfair, hurts competition and increases costs.

“The decision of CCAC to halt bidding may appear to be a success, but does not ensure that future projects will not have a (project labor agreement),” said ABC President Eileen Watt, a former Republican member of Allegheny County Council.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette also picked up the story (“CCAC Cancels Bid Deadline for New Science Building,” 8/11/10).

Despite the CCAC Board of Trustees’ wise decision to take a closer look at the procurement process for this particular project, the fact remains that the threat of PLA activity on future construction on the CCAC campus is still very real.

As a result, the ABC Western Pennsylvania Chapter announced Tuesday that they plan to continue their effort to educate the public about the true nature of wasteful and discriminatory PLAs.

Here is an excerpt from the chapter’s August 10 press release:

In response to CCAC’s decision, ABC urges the CCAC board to turn their words into action, more specifically – policy.

“The decision of CCAC to halt bidding may appear to be a success, but does not ensure that future projects will not have a PLA,” said ABC President, Eileen Watt. “This is a political stunt to appease small businesses in order to save elections,” continued Watt. Originally, CCAC intended to issue blanket PLA’s which would apply to all future construction projects – not just the science building.

“ABC will not consider this a victory until we see a policy that rejects PLA-only bids for all CCAC projects in the future,” said ABC Chairman, Robert Glancy, of R.A. Glancy & Sons. In the 2009 general budget, Allegheny County funded $22 million dollars to CCAC. ABC believes that only a vote from County Council or an executive order from Chief Executive, Dan Onorato, will truly protect taxpayer and student tuition. By allowing competition and keeping markets open, prices will be kept down on projects and the taxpayers will then have a win. ABC argues that until Allegheny County Council and Chief Executive Dan Onorato establish a policy in writing that rejects PLA-only projects, there is no victory for the taxpayers of Allegheny County.

It turns out that the ABC Western Pennsylvania Chapter and its members aren’t the only ones opposed to potential PLA mandates on CCAC projects.  The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s editorial board weighed in on August 11 (“A Rotten Deal,” 8/11/10).

Here are the highlights.

The nonunion Associated Builders and Contractors Inc.’s legal challenge to Community College of Allegheny County’s 90-percent union labor requirement for a $21 million science center project is a textbook case of the unfairness of project labor agreements (PLAs) to taxpayers and nonunion workers.

Citing the lawsuit, CCAC has canceled the bid deadline.

The college’s labor agreement places nonunion firms and their employees at an unfair disadvantage that cries out for elimination. Nonunion contractors should be able to bid without hiring union members. And the public deserves better, too, with study after study showing PLAs needlessly raise costs borne by taxpayers.

Even PLAs that don’t require a percentage of union labor but do require that contractors pay “prevailing wages” — such as those used by Butler and Westmoreland counties’ community colleges — inflate taxpayers’ bills. Set artificially high by union-beholden politicians, prevailing wages help maintain unions’ stranglehold on taxpayer-funded construction jobs.

In challenging the CCAC deal, the contractors group (which also is appealing Commonwealth Court’s approval of a PLA for a $400 million prison to the state Supreme Court) — is fighting for fairness and equity and the best bang for the taxpayers’ buck.

There are clearly more developments to come as this situation continues to develop.

This situation is also an important reminder for why it is essential for the Pennsylvania General Assembly to take action on Rep. John Bear’s (R-Lancaster) H.B. 2010, the Open Contracting Act.  This bill would prohibit PLAs on any commonwealth funded construction projects, which would include this new science center on CCAC’s campus.

Please check out our earlier post for more information on wasteful and discriminatory PLAs on Pennsylvania.

The Merit Construction Alliance alleges that the union officials should have recused themselves when the UMass Building Authority voted in June to require the use of union workers on a massive overhaul of the Boston campus.

The complaint says Francis X. Callahan Jr., president of the Massachusetts Building Trades Council, and Edward W. Collins Jr. of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, represent unions that could collect at least $5.2 million in dues from union workers on the campus project. The Merit Construction Alliance, which represents nonunion contractors and employees, warned after the board’s vote that it would file the ethics complaint against Callahan and Collins, both of whom are appointees of Governor Deval Patrick.

“The union board members were part of an election-year scheme by the Patrick-Murray administration to hand jobs to specials interests, despite the added costs to taxpayers and nonunion workers’’ Ronald N. Cogliano, president of the alliance, said in a statement yesterday.

Callahan told the Globe in June that his lawyers had reviewed his participation in the vote and advised that it would not be a conflict of interest because he will neither sign nor negotiate the contracts involved, nor receive any personal benefit.

In a letter to the Ethics Commission several days before the vote, Callahan asserted that his union’s interests in the project labor agreement were “remote, speculative, and not sufficiently identifiable to require my recusal.’’

“I’m confident there’s no ethical conflict, but I’m not going to comment on the complaint without seeing it,’’ Callahan said yesterday. “I’m not concerned about it.’’

Collins also denied any wrongdoing and called the complaint “a real reach.’’

“I believe I’m in full compliance and my actions as a board member were in full compliance’’ with state ethics laws, he said in an interview yesterday.

The allegation of ethical violations could resonate in the governor’s race because Patrick has strongly supported the union-only work agreement, drawing sharp criticism from his Republican challenger, Charles D. Baker.

Patrick contends that requiring union labor will guarantee a higher quality workforce and eliminate the risk of strikes, thus diminishing the potential for slowing down the complex overhaul and disrupting life on the campus. Baker argues that Patrick pushed the agreement as a favor for politically influential unions, even though it could drive up the cost of the project by $100 million.

The governor has angered many public-sector unions by cutting employee benefits during the economic downturn. He has had better relations with private-sector unions, particularly the construction trades.

In a speech to the Building Trades Council in March, Patrick announced that a labor agreement would be approved for the UMass campus project and that others were being considered for other large projects in the state.

Kyle Sullivan, a Patrick spokesman, declined to comment.

The $750 million in work at UMass Boston is a decadelong undertaking that includes, among other projects, the building of a new science center and the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate.

The 11-member UMass Building Authority, which has five Patrick appointees, approved the agreement on a 9-to-2 vote in mid-June, after Collins and Callahan spoke in favor of the pact.

TheTruthAboutPLAs.com has covered the controversy surrounding Gov. Patrick’s efforts to steer lucrative state construction contracts to his staunchest political supporters: Massachusetts construction trade unions. 

Today the Boston Herald editorial board blasted Gov. Patrick’s orchestration of this anti-competitive and “indefensible” crony contracting scheme. The editorial calls the participation of Big Labor bosses Collins and Callahan in the UMass Building Authority’s PLA vote “fishy” (“Challenging labor,” 8/11):

The Patrick administration’s decision to exclude non-union contractors from $750 million worth of construction projects at UMass-Boston over the next decade is, frankly, indefensible.

According to a group that represents non-union tradespeople, it’s also ethically suspect.

[snip]

It will be up to the Ethics Commission to determine whether a true conflict of interest exists, though on the surface it certainly seems fishy. A reversal of the authority’s vote would be the ideal outcome.

But if the complaint serves simply to renew focus on this horrendous policy decision – which amounts to a giveaway to organized labor that leaves thousands of out-of-work tradespeople still out of work and taxpayers on the hook for millions in unnecessary additional costs – then it will have served a useful purpose.

And if it prompts Gov. Deval Patrick to rethink his plan to expand the use of project labor agreements – which steer public construction work exclusively to unions in exchange for labor “harmony” – then all the better.

Unfortunately for taxpayers and unemployed tradespeople, that seems the unlikeliest of outcomes.

The ethics complaint was filed days after another incumbent Democrat governor’s administration became embroiled in an ethics scandal involving PLAs.

On Aug. 5, the Ohio Inspector General released a report blasting Gov. Ted Strickland’s (D) appointee to the Ohio School Facilities Commission (OSFC), Richard Murray — a former construction union advocate with the Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust (LECET) and union organizer with Local 423 of the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) — who has been strong-arming school districts into using PLAs in order to receive OSFC money for school construction.

The investigation revealed that Gov. Strickland appointed Murray because the prior OSFC director wasn’t doing enough to ensure state contracts were awarded to unionized contractors. Murray was encouraged to steer contracts to union contractors so unions and their members would support Strickland in the upcoming election.

The report documents incredible examples of corruption and unethical behavior. For instance, Murray unilaterally instituted a PLA for Ohio blind and deaf schools that will be a $145,000 windfall for his union and the LECET.  Read all about this clear conflict of interest here and here.

The fascinating twist on this story is that the bids for the deaf and blind schools came in 41 percent - about $11 million – over budget with Murray’s PLA mandate. Ohio law says the schools must be rebid. Big Labor spin-doctors are attempting to convince stakeholders that the PLA was not responsible for the increased costs, but the public isn’t buying it.

There is a chance the schools will be rebid without a PLA, allowing the public to see another real-world experiment (see: case study in Fall River, Mass.) documenting the cost difference between schools bid with and without PLAs.

Three Ohio newspapers have published editorials that attack Strickland and call for Murray to step down as OSFC director. This likely will hurt Gov. Strickland in November.

Govs. Strickland and Patrick are two of  several incumbent Democrat gubernatorial candidates (see: Iowa and Illinois) who have resorted to funneling lucrative state construction contracts to unions via PLAs in order to secure Big Labor’s support in upcoming elections.

Additionally, President Obama was widely criticized for signing a pro-PLA Executive Order 13502 as part of a series of policy moves executed within his first month in office that benefitted Big Labor.  The order and related Federal Acquisition Regulatory (FAR) Council regulationsencourage federal agencies to require PLAs on federal construction projects exceeding $25 million in total cost.

Readers of TheTruthAboutPLAs.com know that Murray was accused of using his influence to bully local communities into using PLAs on school construction projects.  Sparked by complaints from several school districts, the Ohio Inspector General’s office started an investigation into Murray’s conduct this winter.

In a scathing report released on August 5th, the Inspector General’s office outlines efforts by Murray and his Big Labor cohorts to shakedown public officials and school boards for lucrative construction contracts.

More on the release of the report itself and early media attention is available on our earlier post.

The editorial boards from the Columbus Dispatch and Akron Beacon Journal have some thoughts on the Inspector General’s report and Murray’s conduct, but both editorial boards also correctly point out who is really to blame here: Gov. Ted Strickland (D).

First, here is an excerpt from the August 8 editorial by the Columbus Dispatch (“Misfeasance: Head of School-Building Agency Erred, but Governor to Blame,” 8/8/10), with our emphasis is added:

As executive director of the Ohio School Facilities Commission, Richard Murray was supposed to act as a good steward of the millions of dollars Ohio pours into new school buildings every day. Instead, a report by the Ohio inspector general shows, he has abused his position to push the interests of unions, including the one to which he belongs, at substantial cost to the state and local school districts.

His unprofessional behavior disqualifies him for this position.

Murray’s union advocacy comes as no surprise; his career before Gov. Ted Strickland appointed him included more than 12 years as Ohio director of the Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust, a union advocacy group. He is a member of Local 423 of the Laborers’ International Union of North America.

Strickland’s decision in September 2009 to summarily oust well-regarded former Executive Director Michael Shoemaker, a fellow Democrat, and replace him with Murray shows that the governor, too, is far more interested in doing favors for one of his primary constituencies — labor — than in working for Ohioans’ best interests. In fact, Murray says he was instructed by the Strickland administration to treat construction unions as “constituents” and to improve relations with them.

Shortly after taking office, Strickland began stacking the deck for unions by appointing union-friendly members to the Facilities Commission, which promptly lifted the policy that prohibited school districts from requiring contractors to pay the union-level “prevailing wage” on their projects.

[snip]

Under Gov. Bob Taft, school districts undertaking jointly financed school building and renovation projects with the School Facilities Commission were barred from requiring prevailing wage or using project-labor agreements, which in effect require any worker on a commission-financed project to join a union, if only temporarily. Such agreements haven’t proved to improve quality or safety but serve to fill union coffers with mandatory dues. The Taft policy ensured that more school-building money went into school buildings.

Reversing that policy was Strickland’s prerogative, and voters can render a judgment. But, according to the inspector general’s findings, instead of remaining impartial and leaving it to school districts to decide if they wanted to pay more for labor, Murray pushed and bullied some of them to do so.

He met frequently with union organizations, introducing himself as a member of Local 423 and asking the union supporters to be his “eyes and ears” on project sites to report problems with nonunion contractors — a clear indication of his bias.

That was bad enough, but Murray went much further to help twist school officials’ arms. When union representatives visited school officials to argue in favor of union labor, Murray — the keeper of the state purse for school construction — sometimes accompanied them, an implicit message to school officials that their best interest lay in acquiescing to union demands.

He bragged about having fired the commission’s legal counsel, who had tangled with organized labor. He disrupted several building projects in southern Ohio by yanking the commission-assigned project administrator because union officials had complained about her, and he did this without bothering to check out the administrator’s record or investigating the union’s complaints. In other cases, too, he interfered in building projects in response to complaints by unions without verifying the allegations.

Also, Murray stood by while union official Gary Coleman screamed profanities at officials of Clay Local School District in Scioto County during a meeting in which Coleman was pushing the reluctant school district to use a project-labor agreement. Coleman was upset because the district was using a nonunion contractor to do site preparation.

That Murray sat silently while Coleman abused the stunned school officials is shameful. Worst of all, Coleman’s tactic worked; the district eventually signed a project-labor agreement.

Not long after, when the New Boston Local School District declined to sign a project-labor agreement, Murray suddenly raised objections to the site chosen for the project; school officials say he told them that if they would accept a labor agreement, his objections could be worked out. Murray disputes the New Boston officials, but the accusation fits the pattern reported by the inspector general.

Most recently, renovation of the combined campuses of the state-administered Ohio State School for the Deaf and Ohio State School for the Blind gave Murray a chance to impose a project-labor agreement without having to pressure a school board into it. He did so, even though the agreement directly benefits the union he belongs to as well as his former employer, the labor trust.

As is typical, the agreement acted to discourage nonunion contractors from bidding, resulting in fewer and predictably higher bids, the lowest coming in $11 million above the state’s $28 million estimate. Now the project will be delayed because, under state law, it must be rebid.

[snip]

Murray’s actions were grossly unprofessional and unacceptable for the head of a state agency in charge of billions of dollars in public money. The governor faces a choice: Remove an administrator who has ill-served the public, or keep him and thereby choose to serve labor’s interests rather than those of Ohio students and taxpayers.

There is no comment necessary from us - the Columbus Dispatch’s editorial speaks for itself.

Let’s check to see what the Akron Beacon Journal has to say in their August 8 editorial (“Hard Labor,” 8/8/10), with our emphasis added:

Hard labor

The inspector general has found a record of poor judgment at the school facilities commission. Now Richard Murray should resign

Richard Murray is a card-carrying union man. He makes no secret of it. And he shouldn’t. But Murray is also the executive director of the Ohio Schools Facilities Commission, which supervises the biggest school construction program the state ever has undertaken. In that capacity, he has an obligation to maintain a strict separation between his personal links to labor unions and his duty to ensure the program proceeds in a manner that is scrupulously fair and transparent, the results cost-effective.

Last week, the Ohio inspector general released a report on Murray’s dealings with regard to union and non-union contractors. The independent investigation stemmed from growing complaints that Murray was steering contracts to union contractors, cutting out nonunion contractors by aggressively pushing project labor agreements.

The report found no indication the executive director violated the law. The conclusions, nonetheless, are deeply disturbing and raise questions about Murray’s capacity to be sound in his judgment on contract awards. His actions have comprised his credibility to a degree that the integrity of his decisions — and ultimately of the commission and the project as a whole — almost surely will face constant suspicion, damaging his effectiveness in the office.

To protect public confidence in the fairness and integrity of the program, Murray should step down.

The report concluded Murray ”repeatedly failed in his responsibility to remain neutral on union matters” in ways large and small, thereby abusing his authority. It found the director engaged in intimidation and created the appearance of impropriety.

For instance, Murray participated in negotiations and later signed, a labor agreement to construct the schools for the deaf and the blind in Columbus that involved the Ohio Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust. Murray previously headed the organization, which helps union workers and contractors win construction contracts. He also belongs to a union, Local 423, that was part of the agreement. According to the report, both groups could collect dues of up to $145,000 from the agreement.

Ohio newspaper editorial boards are not the only ones to call for Murray’s resignation in the last week.  Here is an excerpt from Associated Builders and Contractors of Ohio’s August 5 press release:

The Inspector General’s (IG) August 5, 2010 report on the conduct of the Ohio School Facilities Commission (OSFC) executive director Richard Murray, sheds new light on possible criminal behavior and an ongoing pattern of abuse of office. “Based on these documented findings, Richard Murray should resign or be terminated so the OSFC can return to performing its important work in a fair and legal manner,” said ABC of Ohio government affairs director Bryan C. Williams.

ABC of Ohio applauds the Inspector General’s office for recognizing where there is smoke there is fire – where there is coercion, there is corruption.

Richard Murray decided to implement a union-only project labor agreement for the construction of the Ohio School for the Deaf. The IG’s report calculated this will result in a payday of at least $145,000 for Mr. Murray’s former union employer. It must be noted the Mr. Murray sought an ethics opinion several months earlier inquiring whether or not he could accept an above the table payment from his former union employer, the Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust (LECET), as a consultant while simultaneously serving as the OSFC executive director.

Surprisingly enough, the Columbus Dispatch reports that Gov. Strickland is standing by Murray as head of the OSFC. Gov. Strickland also claims that his dismissal of Murray’s predecessor as OSFC Director, Mike Shoemaker, was not motivated by Big Labor’s demands.

Here is an excerpt from the Columbus Dispatch article on Gov. Strickland’s response (“Governor Stands by Facilities Chief,” 8/7/10), with our emphasis added:

Gov. Ted Strickland yesterday defended embattled School Facilities Commission Director Richard Murray, rejecting the finding from a state investigation that Murray abused his position in an effort to benefit labor unions.

The governor also flatly denied any suggestion that he fired Mike Shoemaker, the previous director, and installed Murray, a former union official, last year to ensure continued union support and financial backing.

“Absolutely not,” Strickland said when asked about the allegation after an event at the Ohio State Fair.

But Shoemaker, an ex-state lawmaker and son of a former lieutenant governor, insisted that his firing was a result of union pressure on the Strickland administration.

Shoemaker said he thinks the governor’s office is using him as a scapegoat to deflect the inspector general’s report.

[snip]

Still, e-mails obtained by The Dispatch show that Strickland’s prepared remarks for a speech at the Construction Trades Education Conference in Columbus on April 28 included the comment, “we have made project-labor agreements and prevailing wages a priority.”

The report from Charles also suggests that Strickland replaced Shoemaker with Murray last year “in part, to improve relations with unions and ensure that unions were regarded as ‘constituents’ or ’stakeholders’ at the (commission).”

In a transcript of Shoemaker’s March 22 interview with the inspector general’s office, Shoemaker goes a step further: He suggests that union groups wanted him replaced and threatened to withhold support for Strickland if he wasn’t.

“(M)y understanding is there was a meeting the week of July 20th (2009, a week before Shoemaker was fired) with some labor folks with the governor and they said Shoemaker has to go or we’re not going to give you the 400 grand,” the transcript says. “That was the price on my head.”

Shoemaker said yesterday that his information was “second-hand but from a good source.” He could provide no additional details.

One of the most under-reported but apparent trends of the 2010 gubernatorial races is embattled incumbent Democrats aggressively promoting PLAs in a transparent attempt to garner favor with Big Labor (See: Iowa and Illinois).  While the Inspector General’s report outlines the history of the OSFC promoting PLAs throughout the Strickland administration, it is clear that the intensity of this effort increased as the 2010 election approached.

The people of Ohio will have to choose whether they want four more years of Big Labor handouts on November 2.  In the meantime, it is clear that Richard Murray has lost all credibility and needs to step aside.

UPDATE: The Intelligencer/Wheeling News-Register in the Ohio Valley has also weighed in via a 8/10 editorial, “Stop Catering To Ohio Unions” available here:

For several years the Ohio School Facilities Commission’s philosophy was that taxpayers’ dollars should be stretched as far as possible. That changed not long after Gov. Ted Strickland took office. It became clear the governor intended to strengthen his friendship with labor unions that helped get him elected. [snip]

Obviously, Murray needs to be sent packing. The school facilities commission should have a new executive director – one more concerned with making tax dollars go as far as possible than with currying favor with labor unions.

The commission’s policy on prevailing wage contracts needs to change, too. Strickland is using taxpayers’ money to gain support from unions – and Ohio voters should not tolerate it.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer’s editorial, “Ohio school facilities director must go,” 8/10, gave this wise advice:

Murray, whether he believes it or not, has compromised the credibility of his office. Should he fail to resign, Strickland should give him a push. That might be politically expedient, but it’s also the right thing to do.

The Chillicothe Gazette editorial, “Richard Murray should quit or be shown door,” 8/12, said this:

Do the right thing, Governor.

If Murray doesn’t hand you a resignation letter, do him — and yourself — a favor and show him the door. And this time, find a school facilities head who really has students, teachers and Ohio’s families in mind.

The Toledo Blade editorial, “Union ties too tight,” 8/16, warns the charges in the Ohio IG’s report are too serious to ignore and calls Richard Murray a “union hack”:

…But these are serious charges that should not be dismissed cavalierly. As director of the commission, Mr. Murray oversees $2.8 million a day in school construction spending. He has great authority over every stage of school construction projects throughout the state. What he says, what he doesn’t say, whom he associates with – all these things matter and can influence decisions made by local school officials.

And the charges should matter as well to Mr. Strickland, whose strong ties to labor leave him open to accusations of pandering to big donors. If the report by the independent, nonpartisan inspector general’s office is accurate – and there is no reason to assume otherwise – Mr. Murray is a union hack who doesn’t deserve the governor’s support.

h/t Red Mass Group

The Boston Herald editorial board summarized this doublespeak nicely (“A Labored Response,” 7/8):

Gov. Deval Patrick yesterday seemed baffled by the notion that unions have any advantage in the competition for certain public construction jobs. He should read his own public comments more closely.

During his monthly radio appearance on WTKK yesterday a caller asked why unions get preference on public building projects, seemingly a reference to a recent decision by the UMass Building Authority to authorize a “project labor agreement” on the overhaul of the UMass-Boston campus.

“What advantage is being given to union contractors on public jobs?” Patrick fired back at the caller.

Well, let’s see.

UMass-Boston plans to launch $750 million worth of building projects over the next 10 years.

Bids will be restricted to those contractors who agree to abide by the terms of a PLA – those who agree to hire workers through union halls, pay union wages and abide by union work rules.

In effect, that means non-union plumbers, masons, painters, plasterers, electrical contractors, etc. need not apply.

Advantage: unions.

Patrick knows all this, of course. In a March speech to the Building Trades Conference he crowed about his administration’s efforts to put union labor back to work, the near-monopoly that unions had on a $300 million state hospital project in Worcester, and announced his order that, going forward, PLAs would be used when necessary.

Yesterday he seemed to downplay all of that, noting that there is “only one PLA in place right now.” But that one PLA is worth three-quarters of a billion dollars, which buys a whole lot of man hours for idle workers. And if Patrick has his way there will be many more PLAs to come.

To exclude a majority of Bay State building tradespeople from those jobs is bad policy. To deny anything’s amiss is just predictable politics.

Visit our earlier posts for more information on Gov. Patrick’s efforts to steer crony contracts to his political allies.

It comes on the heels of intense media coverage, op-eds and editorials in Massachusetts newspapers of the Umass PLA and The Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby’s sharp criticism of PLAs and Gov. Deval Patrick’s support of these special interest deals that only benefit Big Labor.

Today’s editorial points out that the UMass PLA “is a significant bone to throw to politically powerful construction unions” that Patrick needs help from come election time in November.

Big Labor’s dubious arguments in support of PLAs are rebuked in this editorial:

State law already guarantees that all workers on public projects be paid the “prevailing wage’’ — essentially, the union-negotiated wage — even if they aren’t union members. The state also ensures access to affordable health care. So restricting all bids on the UMass project to firms willing to use union labor is less about protecting the workers than about catering to unions. [snip]

The non-political rationale for restricting bids to firms with union workers is that projects such as the UMass expansion require sophisticated work, and unionized workers tend to be more specialized. But it ought to be within the capability of project overseers to determine which firms are capable of doing the work without enforcing the broad-brush conclusion that union workers are superior.

It’s impossible to say how much, if anything, the union requirement costs taxpayers because there are competing sources of cost and savings. Project labor agreements clearly limit the number of firms that can compete for work, at both the contracting and subcontracting level, and that deprives the project of potential low bidders. But defenders of such labor agreements tout the economic benefits of a smooth-running, on-time project, insisting that the pacts help maintain “labor peace’’ — a term with vaguely threatening intimations.

Maintaining labor standards is laudable. Restricting bids simply to promote unions, without a strong rationale for doing so, is not. Unfortunately, the UMass decision, and Patrick’s support for it, seems more the latter than the former

TheTruthAboutPLAs.com agrees with the Boston Globe’s assessment that PLAs are politically motivated quid pro quo sweetheart deals for Big Labor that reduce competition.

Last week the RCC District Trustees approved spending $1.6 million for staff and consultants to oversee the RCC District’s anti-competitive and costly project labor agreement (PLA) scheme that will govern about $350 million worth of future RCC District construction. 

TheTruthAboutPLAs.com have objected to the absurdity and corruption of PLAs on RCC District projects before, but RCC District trustees beholden to Big Labor’s special interest agenda have taken waste and corruption to a new level with this latest blunder.

Big Labor and RCC District trustees misled the public and falsely-claimed that a PLA would reduce costs and keep projects on budget, despite evidence that PLAs deny jobs to 82.4 percent of the Calif. construction workforce (construction employees who choose not to belong to a union) and increase the cost of construction between 12 percent and 18 percent. By a 3-2 vote, RCC District trustees approved a PLA requirement on all RCC District construction projects over $1 million that use funds from the 2004 voter-approved $350 million Measure C.

Now trustees are flushing more money down the toilet to administer the corrupt backroom PLA deal that will funnel construction contracts to unionized political patrons.

Residents are not happy and The Riverside Press-Enterprise printed an editorial slamming the government-mandated PLA and Riverside Community College District Trustees’ reckless spending to implement anti-competitive and costly crony contracting (“RCC Slams Taxpayers,” 6/23):

Riverside Community College District offers a prime illustration of why public agencies should avoid union-driven labor pacts governing new construction: Taxpayers will pay more than a million dollars just to oversee an unnecessary agreement propelled by politics. And that figure does not include any higher project costs that derive from the deal’s restraint of price-cutting competition.

District trustees last week hired a consulting firm to oversee the “project labor agreement” the board approved in March. The consulting firm’s employees will charge hourly rates of up to $238.71 (equivalent to an annual salary of nearly $500,000), with total compensation as high as $1.6 million, to make sure that the district’s construction projects follow provisions of the labor agreement.

The labor pact essentially requires all contractors to pay union fees and benefits, which are usually the highest around. Those provisions erase any competitive advantage held by nonunion builders — the bulk of the state’s construction work force. So the agreement slashes the amount of money available for new buildings and renovations at district campuses, while simultaneously driving up construction costs.

Trustees have never managed to explain the public benefit of making taxpayers’ $350 million investment in college improvements buy less. A majority of trustees just ignored those added costs, showing more interest in currying favor with union supporters than in responsible oversight of public funds.

Such narrow, self-interested politics directly contradict elected officials’ duty to ensure careful use of public money. The real price of the project labor agreement is only now emerging. But the already visible effects give other public agencies no excuse for missing the clear lesson of the college district’s folly.

TheTruthAboutPLAs.com agrees.

Check out the mailer sent to Riverside taxpayers following the vote by RCCD Trustees to mandate a PLA on future RCCD construction. 

Will Riverside taxpayers hold them accountable?